Meaning of Victual | Babel Free

Definitions

1. Food fit for human (or occasionally animal) consumption.
   archaic
2. Food supplies; provisions.
   archaic, in-plural
3. Edible plants.
   obsolete, specifically
4. Grain of any kind.
   Scotland, obsolete, specifically

Equivalents

Examples

“Shift bore (for il aire) as best ye do thinke, / and twise a day giue him fresh vittle and drinke: […]”

“[T]hough the Cameleon Loue can feed⟳ on the ayre, I am one that am nouriſh'd by my victuals; and would faine have⟳ meate: [...]”

“[T]he Making of Things Inalimentall, to become⟳ Alimentall, may be an Experiment⟳ of great Profit, for Making new Victuall.”

“For as the Teeth in Beasts of Prey / Are Swords, with which they fight⟳ in Fray. / So Swords in Men of War, are Teeth, / Which they do eat⟳ their Vittle with.”

“Friday told me, ſuch a Boat would do very well, and would carry⟳ much enough Vittle, Drink⟳, Bread, that was his Way of Talking.”

“I must confess your wine and vittle / I was too hard upon a little: / Your table neat, your linen fine; / And though in miniature, you shine⟳: […]”

“He [Samuel Keimer] was usually a great glutton, and I promised myself some diversion in half starving him. He agreed to try⟳ the practice, if I would keep⟳ him company. I did so, and we held it for three months. We had our victuals dress'd, and brought to us regularly by a woman in the neighborhood, who had from me a list of forty dishes, to be prepar'd for us at different times, in all which there was neither fish⟳, flesh, nor fowl, and the whim suited me the better at this time from the cheapness of it, not costing us above eighteen pence sterling each per week.”

“Robin promis'd me / A' my winter vittle; / Fient haet he had but three / Goos feathers and whittle.”

“Man is not what one calls a happy animal; his appetite for sweet victual is so enormous.”

“[D]inner was announced by Bailey junior in these terms: "The wittles is up!"”

“And down a rocky pathway from the place⟳ / There came a fair-hair'd youth, that in his hand / Bare victual for the mowers: […]”

“[H]is motto was, "Meat first, and spoon vittles to top off on."”

“'Terence, this is stupid stuff: / You eat⟳ your victuals fast enough; / There can't be much amiss, 't is clear, / To see⟳ the rate you drink⟳ your beer.[']”

“It is good to make⟳ prouiſion, for peraduenture wee ſhall lacke victuals and wee lie⟳ in campe on Blacke Heath long.”

“The citie was thus taken, many of the Turks fled into the caſtell, the reſt were put⟳ vnto the ſword, man, woman, and child; and amongſt them alſo many of the Chriſtians, the furious ſouldiers taking of them no knowledge. Great wealth was there found, but ſmall ſtore of victuals.”

“[C]onſider, what Victuall or Eſculent Things there are, which grow⟳ ſpeedily, and within the yeere, As Parſnips, Carrets, Turnips, Onions, Radiſh, Artichokes of Hieruſalem, Maiz, and the like⟳. […] The Victuall in Plantations, ought to be expanded, almoſt as in a Beſieged Towne; That is, with certaine Allowance.”

“But if the beast and branks be spar'd / Till kye be gaun without the herd, / An' a' the vittel in the yard, / An' theckit right, / I mean⟳ your ingle-side to guard / Ae winter night.”

CEFR level